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Time Lapse Video of Apricot YW Levain

Time Lapse Video of Apricot YW Levain

Time Lapse Video of Apricot YW LevainI started a new test Yeast Water culture. Yesterday afternoon, it look active enough to consider a rise test. In the past. I have spent too much time running back and forth checking and writing down the data. This time I just did a time lapse video of the process. The 1 frame every 40 seconds of real time.http://www.youtube.com/user/RonRay33?feature=mhum#p/aRon

Pamela, this was the first time I've tried anything with fresh apricots. The YW was unusual, of course, there is nothing close to the amount of sugar that is in the dried ones. It started fast, then slowed. I dropped a sugar cube in and it was in a froth in no time, then slowed in a few hours and stopped overnight. I tasted it and it had no sugar in the taste that I could detect. This pattern continued... it seems to go through sugar like an SUV goes through gas. I'll do one of my standard loaves with Apricot YW only - especially since the is a bit of 'tang' in fresh apricot already.

I may buy blueberries, today. I'd like to see how blue the dough might go with all of the water from BYW, but we will see.

Ron, If I may be so bold, I've already run that test with your Sweet Clementine loaf, AP flour and all BYW, and colorwise, not so much blue as darker brown. I think the pigment in the water is much more diffuse and all but disappears in the dough once the water is cooked out.

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If I wanted colored dough, I'd replace all of the water in the final dough with blueberry puree. Google says fresh blueberries are 84% water so I calculate a test formula of:

66g starter (flour/BYW @100%)

158g blueberry puree (132L,26S)

175g AP flour

4g salt

234:166 = 70% hydration dough

total loaf =403g

If you don't make this I will in the next couple of days. I'm not sure it will taste of blueberries, but it should have a cool blue tinge.

I wasn't sure how much of the actual BYW you had used in the loaf. So, thanks for the added info. I'll pass on the BYW for the present then. I certainly don't lack for things I want to do... ROFL

As you have also observed, and as I certainly agree, having more that a fleeting suggestion - it the still warm loaf - it is most unlikely that one could tell by flavor alone, just what YW was used to leaven a loaf. So, no, I would not expect a blueberry taste (sadly).

Judy, that was all I was testing. But, it would permit a time plot of the rise rate as a function of time and the time that the peak held and what the % of of max rise was. But, since it was only an "is it alive" verification, that would be wasted overkill.

I did think it was enough fun to watch, that I'd post it for TFL members.

Ron, from your excellent video, here is an approximation of what happened in graph form. Now, what I'm wondering what would happen if you were to take a seed from this, feed it more flour and YW and redo the video/graph - would it be faster, bigger, stronger? Inquiring minds need to know!!

Sorry Pamela, I didn't read beyond the graph... at first (had a Dr. appt) What would happen next....?

Normally, I would not have let the levain rise beyond (at very most) 90% Much as you would not want your final dough to over-proof and collapse.

If this were a Build #1, then at 75 to 85% I would mix it with a flour and a water (or YW) of the same weight as the total weight of the original Build #1. So, build -#2 would be 1:1:1 (seed:flour:water). I would expect it to rise at a faster rate, yes (already having a lot more hungry WBBs). Also, as soon as it got in the 75-58% of that rise, I would take that Build-#2 and use it as the seed for Build -#3 1:1:1 and when it reached 75-58% of that rise I would use it straight into the Final Dough with a real pack of very active WBBs to drive the Bulk and then final rise and baked loaf.

My question was more academic/analytical test-tube based rather than practical bound for the oven. My question suggests taking the levain to the limits then comparing the respective cycles of growth/plateau/decay between the respective builds using YW, using a portion of previous builds for the seed and feeding with flour and YW. If we increase the population of WBBs by feeding YW instead of H20, holding the overall volume of levain constant, would there be a point where the WBBs break down, too crowded to grow? Would it ultimately explode in a fireball and create a black hole? How many builds would it take?

For baking, as we've already discussed, we agree, I would never want to take it that far. If your levain started at 35ml and doubled at 70ml and peaked at 100ml, then when it doubles at 70ml it would be well within that optimal interval of 75-58%, so the mantra of "doubling then feeding" works for me.

Sometimes it gets confusing when folks talk about waiting for the wild yeast starters to peak, then collapse and then feed it, when essentially it is spent. Does stressing the yeast this way make them stronger (survival of the fittest) or just angry, sticky and sour? Whereas others (you and I included) think the action (feeding/chilling/baking) should happen when the starter is young and strong. Does this constitute coddling the yeast and creating a bunch of wimps and 90-lb weaklings or do they thrive best when they are well looked after?

Is there any logic to feeding more than 1:1:1, say 1:2:2, or 1:3:3? Obviously the cycle would take longer to peak as it would have more food to eat relative to the seed yeast colony, but at the same time, we're adding more WBB in the YW so maybe not so much time lag.

Okay, Pamela, I gronk your meaning - at least in overview. I will digest it more fully tomorrow, but for the moment I will say this. The second you add flour into the YW environment, you have started a war of attrition that the YW WBBs will be battling with the SD WBBs. To the extent of what to expect from the SD WBBs, I'd say read the volumes of information the Debra Wink as provided on the subject. But IMHO, your YW culture will benefit most and stay strongest only by maintaining it as close to its initial stronghold - the fruit it has chosen. Extract what you are willing to sacrifice of your YW culture and kiss it good bye (for the benefit of the loaf you will bake) as soon as you introduce it to wheat flour (or other grain or YW cultures than its own).

but being slow of mind and technically challenged, I didn't know how to interpret the timer while it was quickly ticking away and exactly how long it took for your test to double. Indeed it was fun to watch. :-p.

Judy, every 40 seconds the video camera took one picture. The clock is a real clock - in hours and minutes. Videos show you many images every second, in order to seem as if they were one continuous motion. Once the YW that started at 1:50 PM had spent several hours in rising to peak and starting to collapse had all those images (1, every 40 seconds) the camera was stopped and all the images played back as if they'd been taken at a normal video speed.

The result is what you saw, and the method is called "time lapse video". I hope that makes sense to you now.

for your explanation. I understand this how this video is made now except where you mention the 75-85% and then 75 - 58% in the subsequent builds. What does 58% refer to, I'm guessing it's the drop after the rise? Pls forgive me if I'm being a nuisance with all these questions. I blame it on my poor education ;-p

In my book - which I keep far away from my weighty binders - you have now reached the pinnacle in your record keeping of the wee beasties your are currently in residence with.

Watching your video brought to mind videos that a parent takes of a child (Please note that I am a parent of 3 children and have numerous videos of all 3 most of which show them doing just about nothing but being cute - ie, they provide no imperical data what-so-ever other than that of their parents being able to operate a video camera...) only I enjoyed yours more in that it was short - a mere 11 seconds - yet covered it all! LOL

And your short video has already had more viewers than all of my kid videos combined ROFL. Of course my videos have not been put out into cyberspace......

I love all the information you keep putting out here! and your latest is no exception!

Very cool, Ron! I love time lapse. It reminds me of those National Geographic time lapses of ants devouring a mouse on the forest floor that I watched as a kid! But it can be a great tool to get to know your starter. For a while now, I have been wanting to experiment how my starter responds to different feeding ratios. I thought of dividing it up and feeding it 1:1:1 /1:2:2/1:5:5 etc, keeping them all at the same temp and then seeing how long it takes for them to peak. Perhaps repeating the experiment at a few different temps just to get more data and then hopefully being able to extrapolate the ideal feeding ratio for my starter at a given temp. Time lapse would be perfect for this. What equipment do you need? Can you do it with any video camera?

I love Pamela's graph, too. That is just the sort of data I am looking for on my own starter.

When I did all the data plotted in The Banana Saga posting, it was a very long period of setting the computer timer for 14 minutes so I had 1 min. to get to the SD, or BSD to measure the rise at 15 min intervals. That was how my days were spent, and anything else had to be squeezed into those 14 minute "off-duty" periods. I just wished that I'd thought of getting a digital video camera that would do time lapse back then.

The setting and processing can be confusing - at least what I used. It all was taken at 40 sec/frame. Measure at 1-1/2minutes/hour, but plays back the 17 MB file at a rate of something like 60 frames/second. I can, however, step through it frame by frame, or drag the slider to basically read the rise level at any time point. I image Pamela did that to make the graph - nice job Pamela).

My DH has a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology. I guess all those hours spent at his lab rubbed off on me and is coming out many, many years later. I do think yeast cells are inherently more fun than cancer cells, tho. I'm waiting for my blueberry YW to reactivate before I start my next round of tests.

D. Wink goes deeply into feeding patterns, ratios, etc. It is all in her posts, which you can find in the TFL Search function. She is the one with the microscope and on the personalname basis with the WBBs.

I, on the other hand, am an operant based person, a 'Black Box' oriented person. I do not know what goes on in the levain, all I know is what the total lavain does in response to changes to the outside of the 'black box' . I feed it, it grows. I cool it, it slows down in growth, etc.

As long as 1:1:1 gives me what I want - without unwanted side effects - I keep using it to get whatever else it is I am working out to my satisfaction. Once, I start to feel caught up in my current questions, then I start playing with some other aspect that I've been wanting to explore/play with.

I know what happens if I try too may things at one time - everything becomes too chaotic to give any clear answers. So, I plug along (Yes, Karin, like an ant, not a grasshopper) until my current questions have been satisfied. I know that once there are too few questions left, once the surprises come too few and far between, I know I become bored and start seeking a new playground.

Baking and making bread has so many potential questions and surprises that it could, and has, kept people interested for thousands of years. So, don't be discouraged it you seem to have LOTs of questions left to answer.

I see I have competition in the questioning dept....well, that is okay because my questions have abated somewhat due to your thorough documentation (and Akiko's and Daisy's) on the subject of YWs.

But I am glad someone has stepped in to keep you on your toes. LOL

And anyway you know what they say about inquiring minds....... :-)

So as not to let you rest on your laurels too long I do have another question for you....

Have you used fresh whole wheat flour in any of your loaves or leaven feeds?

My loaves - with leaven builds and without - still turn out more tangy than what I expect and I am thinking it is due to the fresh ww flour that I use.....and I figured you are the one who can answer this continuing conundrum for me.....

Yes, Janet. I have used WW, but if you mean 'Home milled' by the "fresh", then no. If you mean 'Fresh out of a KAF's bag' Yes, again.

I believe, Jeffrey Hamelman suggested a portion of the salt destined for the loaf could be used in a soaker of the WW to reduce that problem. However, I believe there is something about fresh ground that tends to make it less than optimal for baking bread.

But, I am not the person to ask about either WW, or fresh ground WW. Especially on TFL with all those who seem to live and breath WW loaves. Post a question.

I think this might be the first 'non answer' I have ever gotten from you....an area you have not ventured into 'yet'.......

My flour is home milled and it works well - actually GREAT - with my regular SD. I have learned how to adjust the sour according to HL, temp. and type and amount of food per feeding but have not been successful....yet....doing the same with my YW. (Truth be told....I don't always get it right with the SD but it is forgiving and the neighbors and our handyman are always game for anything out of my oven ;^)

Since I have finally stumped you with one of my inquires I will have to lumber on under my own guidance or....I can wait for you to branch out into another YW experiment.....your observations and conclusions are always superior to mine.

I know you will find this hard to believe but there are times when I do exhibit patience....and this may be one of them. I am waiting on YOU since you have such a well established relationship with your WBBs......I think they are better behaved than mine are. ROFL

(All I have researched here from those experimenting with YW - AP or BF are the main flours in their loaves. WW, rye and spelt being 'accents' and none have used home milled. Usually KA flours.....)

Thank you for the youtube upload, you are very neat person. I think your video make even more sense for beginner like me. I really appreciate your write up on these particular topics. What bread recipes are you going to bake for the apricot yeast water? I hope you have a great memorial weekend.

I am doing one of my standard test loaves - as in "A Standard KISS Loaf, or Keep It Simple Smiley " posted a couple of days ago. A 478g size pan bread in a turkey pan DO. I will post the results - especially since the levain is very fast acting.

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